Messages by Nikolas

Hello everybody again

We're furiously packing our bags for a Monday departure to Beijing. We're pretty excited and just about keeping our heads together. I think.

I wondered if anybody had any advice about phones and so on when you hit the ground in China. I've been looking into the Skypes and Magic Jacks of the world with little fruit to show for my labours. And forget about phone cards and sim cards, it's tough getting comprehensible information.

Has anybody found a cheap, reliable VoIP company that works from China? Is there such a thing as Top-Up phones in China for a mobile? Who are the good phone companies?

As ever, the sage advice of the Global TESOL graduates would be soothing stuff indeed for these weary suitcase packers...

Thanks for reading

Niko and Emilia

Thank you both for your responses, most kind! I'll try to report back for future reference.

Hello all
My girlfriend and I are about to depart for NE China. We were wondering if anybody had some good tips on things that we might want to take with us (for example I read elsewhere that deodorant can be tough to source).

Also we think taking gifts for our recruiter, school director and maybe pupils would be a nice touch but we're worried about making a cultural faux-pas, perhaps by creating obligations or crossing some hierarchical boundary, I don't know. Has anyone had any experiences of this? We'd really appreciate your sharing if so.

Thanks and Happy New Year to Team Adam!

Niko

Perhaps the message is educate yourself prior to departure. This is what I took from the OP. A lot of what's said is applicable to all of the West's economic systems. Check out Ronaldo or Lloyd Blankfein's paypackets compared to workers in materially productive jobs for an example of the value the West places on plumbers and Builders.

It sounds like China perhaps makes these differentials much more apparent and I imagine that might be shocking. Hopefully that shock can be lessened by preparing for this economic shock in advance.

Perhaps the message is educate yourself prior to departure. This is what I took from the OP. A lot of what's said is applicable to all of the West's economic systems. Check out Ronaldo or Lloyd Blankfein's paypackets compared to workers in materially productive jobs for an example of the value the West places on plumbers and Builders.

It sounds like China perhaps makes these differentials much more apparent and I imagine that might be shocking. Hopefully that shock can be lessened by preparing for this economic shock in advance.